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is a skilled Irish tune player with plenty of internal rhythm playing his EC.

Yes, but it still sounds like someone playing Irish music on an EC. Compare it with say Florence Fahy's playing say on the Holly Bush on http://www.concertinachick.com/Tunes.php There's a pulse in Florence's anglo playing I'm not hearing in the EC sample. I don't think the EC precludes nyah, but perhaps it and the piano accordion encourage regularity?

As to me you' right, Terry. All the notes seem to be there, but there's no successfull emulating of the certain "resistance" of the bisonoric Anglo (as played across the rows). To much mimikry for my taste...

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Well yes. That's decent EC playing but not quite capturing the spirit of ITM as evidenced by Terry's clip (great link/site, by the way). So it's harder to get that pulse on an English, just as it's quite hard to play legato on an anglo... but it can be done. As has already been said, it's about immersing yourself in the tradition as distinct from learning the instrument then learning assorted tunes from different traditions.

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Albeit not aiming for any true "ITM" sound myself I nevertheless believe that in general an attempt of emulating another kind of instrument (be it as closely related as the three concertina systems are or so to speak farer away like f.i. a fiddle) would suffer from too much mimikry and restriction to just the capabilities of the model instrument, i.e. only chords that can be played across the rows, or only double stops that can be executed on a fiddle.

IMO it takes lots of liberties to really achieve a different spirit...

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Fascinating and complex issue: mere mimicry of other instruments sounds very limiting but that doesn't mean we can't learn from them and apply their techniques to our own instrument. After all, a lot of Irish concertina style (not to mention flute style) is ultimately an application/adaptation of piping technique.

It's also important that a particular style of music (such as those found in ITM with or without the inverted commas) owes a lot to the instruments on which the music has traditionally been played. It makes more sense referencing fiddle than, say, French horn in your playing of a Sligo reel.

Of course traditions accept new instruments and there's no reason why we shouldn't play Irish music on EC. But it's hard to find traditional models - which is where this thread started. So anglo playing (and piping/fiddling/fluting) seems like a logical place to start. Otherwise, we run the risk of making our Irish tunes sound just the same as our English/French/Swedish tunes.

And that would never do.

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anglo playing is definitely part of what one should be taking into account, but because anglo expresses air bisonorically and EC does not, its usefulness as a model, while important, has caveats---kind of like using harmonica, which is bisonoric, as a model for playing irish music on flute or whistle....

re legato on anglo--it is easy in the keys which have plenty of bidrectional notes, if you learn all ways of playing your doubled notes. i believe that mr. bertram levy is an expert and specialist in this area. the abundance of doubled bidirectional notes on anglo allows much greater expressive choice between different pathways depending on how you want to phrase, than has been appreciated in some quarters of anglo playing. certainly it is underppreciated in itm.

in fiddle jargon, this might be termed, "long bow" versus "short bow" phrasing. i have run into rigidity about this on the part of some irish players/teachers of the anglo, who think it's inconceivable that one might deliberately playing "long bow" on the anglo in chosen phrases. the exact same degree of fluid, "long-bow" phrasing they might love in a clare or east galway fiddler, they'll be appalled by in an anglo concertina. there seems to be a block about seeing and fully employing this feature of anglo, but expecting artists not to employ this choice is as silly as expecting all fiddlers to play "short-bow" sawstroke style....

Edited March 11, 2014 by ceemonster

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RE bisonoric as a starting point or model for getting an originally-bisonoric style on unisonoric, here is a cajun box player named chris miller who plays both 1-row cajun melodeon and PA. ha, this gent might be an argument for learning the bisonoric as prep for doing the style on unisonoric.... i think the PA played here sounds just as good for cajun dance as the 1-row, myself....the timbre and lungs of the 2 are quite different, of course...

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I've been pondering this whole topic for some time. Here's where I come down: YMMV

1) It is probably the case that attempting to duplicate what and anglo does on and EC is doomed to failure. Just as with the example of emulating harmonica on a whistle what the instrument does, what limits it might have and how those are overcome affect what the instrument can do.

2) Consider the ornamentation used by different instruments. Same note triplets are the domain of banjos and bounced bow fiddle, but don't sound as well on 'tina, though of course they can be done (just not by me ) Crans can be played on things other than pipes but they really are a pipe ornament. Etc. Anglo and EC have different capabilities which will lead to different ornaments, different chord tone choices etc.

3) It may be the case that emulating what a fiddle does would come closer for an EC player...or maybe not. At least they are closer together in what they do than EC and Anglo.

4) The real test of whether a performance is within the style has much more to do with the style of the MUSIC than with the style of any particular instrument, so I think judgements about performance need to be made on that standard and not on whether one instrument matches what another particular instrument does.

Comments?

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I widely agree. As for me, there is some emulating, but (as already mentioned above) not by limiting my choices of chording, ornamentation a.s.f. but rather capturing certain fitting figures and patterns - and in doing so the style of one certain instrument (in my case, according to your remark, mainly the fiddle, which is quite within the reach of an EC player with this objective) will have an effect on playing the other.

Regarding the music, which is in fact of more importance than any particular instrument, a given "style" will be characterized by the typical style of all instruments contributing, and any such instrumental style will leap to the fellow instruments (or in fact instrumentalists) to some extent.

It's in this wide traditional field where I'm trying to position myself with playing my instruments, of which presently the EC has become the most important.

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regarding azalin's comment about ec and speed---from what i can see, speed is not an issue--its facility at very rapid tempos is one of the things ec is vaunted for. the issue i've encountered is that there is something about playing in that vertical layout with your thumb in the strap that makes it a reall challenge to get full valve expression on notes falling at certain reach angles when playing at a clip. it's not hitting the note at fast speed, it's managing enough pressure to get certain notes to bark out full-voiced at fast speed when the note is placed in an awkward bend or reach.....that is definitely an area where the bisononric anglo system shines...on anglo, you are always sure to be angled squarely over the note and able to press squarely...

[3) It may be the case that emulating what a fiddle does would come closer for an EC player...or maybe not. At least they are closer together in what they do than EC and Anglo.]

the "long-bow" fiddle style is my favorite model when playing unisonoric free-reed instruments....it's an "ideal," since you can't emulate it 100%.....

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Now that is interesting. I think what he's doing is using the wrist strap with which some ECs were fitted (listed as WS in the Wheatstone ledgers) but holding it like an anglo strap, with his thumb over the strap. It looks like he's used the screw ordinarily used for the thumb strap to hold the top of the wrist strap, although some Lachenals I've seen have a fitting for the strap in that position. Can't tell whether the pinkie grip is still there.

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Here's a little clip for your perusal - from the Höör Irish Music Festival 2014 last weekend.

Great clip, and (as always) great playing!

Should get the discussion about Irish on the English going again...

Worth a revival, for sure.

...or maybe one on EC design ;-)

Also worth discussion, but very much deserves its own thread... not here, but in the "Instrument Construction & Repair" section.

In fact, I think I'll start one now, to try to avoid the confusion of intermingling the two issues. (I've done it. Here's the link.)

Henrik, I know you feel that various of your modifications assist you in playing Irish music, but I also know that others don't feel that they need them, so your design isn't really a subtopic of "Irish on the English".